FORESTS IN ITALY
(Data source: National Inventory of Forests and Carbon Sinks, INFC 2005)

Forests and Other wooded lands cover 10.467.533 ha, corresponding to 34.7% of the country’s total land area. Forests represent 83.7% of this area while Other wooded lands comprise the remaining 16.3%.

Forests cover 8.759.200 ha, about 29.1% of the country’s total land area. Liguria and Trentino are the most wooded Regions, where Forests cover 62.6% and 60.5% respectively of the total land area. The Regions with the lowest percentage of forests are Puglia (7.5%) and Sicilia (10%). Forests mainly comprise “Tall Forests” (forest stands with height potentially > 5m) (97%) while Forest formations for wood production and Areas temporally without forest cover 0.01% and 0.006% of the total National surface respectively.

Other wooded lands (1.708.333 ha) are formed by shrub formations (58%), mostly represented by maquis (“macchia”) and Mediterranean shrubs (690.811 ha), particularly in Sardegna.

Regarding property, 66% of Forests are privately owned (mainly by individual owners) and 34% are on public lands. In particular, most of the public forests belong to Communes and Provinces (65.5%) and only 23.7% belongs to the State and Regions.

At the national level, the most common forest categories are oak forests (Q. robur, Q. pubescens, Q. petrea, Q. cerris, Q. frainetto, Q. trojana, Q. vallonea, 24.3%) and beech forests (F. sylvatica, 12%), covering over 1 million hectares each. Among conifers, the most represented are red spruce forests (P. abies, 6.8%), pine forests (5.3%) (P. nigra, P. leucodermis, Mediterranean pines), and L. decidua and P. cembra forests (4.4%),

As regards species composition, 68% of the Tall forests are pure broadleaves forests, 13.5% are pure coniferous forests, 9.7% are mixed coniferous-broadleaves forests.

Considering forest types, 41.8% of Italian forests are coppices (3.663.143 ha), while 36.1% are high forests (3.157.965 ha). Coppices include coppices with standards (27.4%), coppices without standards (9.9%) compound coppices (4.3 %) and uneven aged coppices (0.2%). High forests include: even-aged forests (15.5%), uneven-aged forests (18.6%), and coppices in conversion to high forests (1.7%).

On the whole, 87.1% of Forests are under legal restrictions for soil protection (according to national law 3267/1923); this percentage exceeds 95% in some Regions of Northern and Central Italy (Trentino, Alto Adige, Veneto, Umbria, Toscana). These legal restrictions concern 49.2% of Other wooded lands.

On the whole, 27.5% of Forests are under legal restrictions for nature conservation; this percentage is higher in some regions of Southern and Central Italy (over 50% in Abruzzo, Campania, Puglia and Sicilia). On the whole, 7.6% of forests are included in National parks and 6.7% in Regional parks, according to National law 394/1991. Moreover, 22.2% of Forests are included in Nature 2000 sites (SCI e SPZ).